Bal-elohim: The Observers

On those sad and terrible occasions when an Elohite loses sight of the true reasons for being, the former angel usually forgets his objectivity, giving in to a flurry of passions and tumbling screaming to Hell as a Habbalite, not even realizing what has truly happened. But, on a few, rare occasions, these precariously-balanced angels topple the other way. Instead of giving in to passions, they instead distance themselves too much from emotions in the quest for objectivity. They become incapable of feeling even the slightest hint of emotion, and perceive it as simply an uncontrolled mechanism that drives the cogs of others. They view all beings as mechanistic, and scoff at the very concept of free will. They become something terribly hard and cold, yet perfectly aware of its transformation—they simply don't care.

Appearance and manner

In celestial form, Bal-elohim appear similar to their old forms, except as ruthlessly perfect beings, painful to even behold. Their eyes in particular shine with a cold hard light that is impossible to look at even for an instant.

They tend to keep the same sorts of vessels they had as angels, and always maintain a clean and efficient persona.

Resonance

Elohim that manage to purge themselves of any trace of emotion can still sense it quite accurately in others, and predict how it will affect them. Their old angelic resonance functions as it used to, but they cannot develop the long-term bonds that more sophisticated uses of their resonance require. However, their total dissociation from emotion yields enhanced clarity as their personal symphony stills. By straining, they can pick out bits of the True Symphony itself. By accepting a penalty to their perception roll equal to the maximum desired check digit, they may make use of the basic Seraph resonance to detect truth (mechanics similar to a Habbalite emulating the Elohite resonance).

Dissonance

Unlike Bene-elohim, which may feel emotion in a controlled manner so long as it does not affect their course of action, even the faintest taint of feeling is antithetical to the Bal-elohim. Feeling any sort of emotion or caring about anything is dissonant. (Unlike Djinn, they really DON'T care.) If a Bal-elohite acquires excessive dissonance from his band restriction (fails his dissonance roll), he explodes in a storm of emotion that ultimately leaves him a Habbalite, and one who thinks he just redeemed at that…

Creation

An Elohite who Falls due to violating only his Superior's dissonance condition, in ways consistent with an end-justifies-the-means philosophy and coldly calculated to improve the "greater good" without regard to localized suffering created, and who does not violate the Elohite dissonace condition, may become a Bal-elohite, at the GM's discretion. A Habbalite who has emptiness inflicted on him, and who rolls 666 on his dissonance roll becomes so drained of emotion as to realize his actual state, but does not pursue redemption. Instead, he becomes a Bal-elohim, never feeling emotion again…

General

Bal-elohim are exceedingly rare. Hell typically has no more than a score of them at any given time. Princes value them exceedingly highly for their investigative abilities, something few other demons can even come close to matching. Asmodeus has the majority in his service, and deploys them very carefully. Baal has requisitioned about half as many, in the name of the war effort. Kronos finds them useful, but less so than other princes, as his remaining ties to the Symphony let him modify his Balseraphs to fill such roles. Vapula has a handful as well, finding their ability to perceive the Symphony infinitely useful. His lack of typical Habbalite behavior have led some to question whether or not he might have become one himself over the ages, despite never having seen the light of Heaven. All attempts to replicate them so far have failed miserably, though there have been a few interesting spinoffs…

Typical Discords

Frigid - This discord causes the affected celestial's vessel to be unnaturally cold. At level one, this manifests as merely unusually cold and clammy skin, almost corpse-like. This increases, until at level six ordinary humans actually take damage from the cold burns caused by merely touching the affected celestial. This coldness feels unnatural, and humans will shrink back from it instinctively. Social rolls are likely to suffer a penalty equal to the level of the discord.